Four different types of UBI can be chosen from: €400, €1000 or €1400 per month for each adult (18+) and a fourth type: €650 for each adult, €300 for each child (18-) and an additional €600 for each household. According to Vereniging Basisinkomen, the latter variant would put an end to the poverty trap caused by the current system in the Netherlands, where people may end up gaining less than 5% after a salary raise of 50%.

Once the choice for one of the types of UBI is made, people can then choose what sources to use in order to finance it. The tool allows a broad variety of choices such as income tax, VAT, abolishment of existing subsidies, savings on expenses on healthcare and civil servants, transformation of the mortgage system, different types of taxation on assets and resources etc.

All types of UBI can be made affordable in the tool depending on how the parameters are adjusted. At the end of the calculation, the effects on seven different groups of people are shown in a table, where the user can can see that the higher incomes will be net payers.

Vereniging Basisinkomen is already planning to develop a version 2.0 of the calculation tool, where people will be able to see what a UBI would mean for their personal situation.

About Hilde Latour

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